Christopher M. Farella has extensive experience representing small entrepreneurial ventures and large multinational corporations, domestic Fortune 100, middle market, and international affiliates. In particular, Mr. Farella has provided counsel to and conducted litigation in state and federal courts for a wide array of businesses, which include the pharmaceutical, defense contracting, manufacturing, publishing and airline industries. Mr. Farella also represents clients in national mediations and arbitrations. He is certified by the Center for Dispute Settlement in Washington, D.C., and served as a mediator with the N.J. Statewide Roster of Mediators for Civil, General Equity and Probate Cases on a broad range of matters.
Mr. Farella focuses his practice in the areas of employment law, commercial litigation and white-collar criminal defense. He has litigated cases that encompass employment discrimination, wrongful termination, sexual harassment, restrictive covenants, commercial fraud, money laundering, conspiracy, and RICO. He has defended clients against investigations conducted by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, state human rights agencies, and the U.S. Attorneys' Office. Mr. Farella concentrates on identifying and avoiding problems before they arise for his clients through counseling, development of employment handbooks, workplace policy and procedures. He has lectured at seminars on topics ranging from FMLA, harassment investigations to wrongful termination claims.
In the course of representing clients before the state and federal appellate courts, two of his cases involving novel questions of law resulted in published decisions: Murphy v. Luongo, 338 N.J. Super. 260 (App. Div. 2001), a case involving a mayor's act of appointing a temporary chief of police without the council's advice and consent; and LaPorta v. Gloucester Country, 340 N.J. Super. 254 (App. Div. 2001), which has become the leading New Jersey case on attorney work product privilege. Other reported cases in which Mr. Farella participated are In re Grand Jury, 171 F.3d 826 (3d Cir 1999), Johnson v. Yurick, 156 F.Supp.2d 427 (D.N.J. 2001), United States v. Paster, 64 F.Supp.2d 429 (M.D.Pa. 1999).
Mr. Farella also serves as Chair of the New Jersey Supreme Court District Ethics Committee and has authored several articles, including "Use of Probability Analysis to Define a Defendant's Intent Level in a Criminal Case," (co-author M. Marpet) St. John's University Review of Business, Fall 2005 and is a contributing writer for the Handmade Beauty Business magazine on management employment issues.
Mr. Farella received his law degree from Seton Hall University School of Law and his bachelor's degree from Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, with High Honors. He is admitted to practice in the states of New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania; the United States Supreme Court; the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit; the United States District Court, District of New Jersey; the United States District Court, the Southern District of New York; and the United States District Court, Eastern District of Pennsylvania.